t when he sang that his beloved was so perfect a beauty that no
one had ever been able to see her whole body because the eye refused
to leave whatever part it first alighted on. This pretty notion is
turned into unconscious burlesque by the author of No. 274, who
complains,

"How can I describe her from whose limbs the eyes that
see them cannot tear themselves away, like a weak cow
from the mud she is sticking in."

Hardly less grotesque to our Western taste is the favorite boast (No.
211 _et passim_) that the moon is making vain efforts to shine as
brightly as the beloved's face. It is easier for us to sympathize with
the Hindoo poets when they express their raptures over the eyes or
locks of their beloved:

No. 470: "Other beauties too have in their faces
beautiful wide black eyes, with long lashes, but they
cannot cast such glances as you do."

No. 77: "I think of her countenance with her locks
floating loosely about it as she shook her head when I
seized her lip--like unto a lotos flower surrounded by
a swarm of (black) bees attracted by its fragrance."

Yet even these two references to personal beauty are not purely
esthetic, and in all the others the sensual aspect is more emphasized:

No. 556: "The brown girl's hair, which had succeeded in
touching her hips, weeps drops of water, as it were,
now that she comes out of the bath, as if from fear of
now being tied up again."

No. 128: "As by a miracle, as by a treasure, as in
heaven, as a kingdom, as a drink of ambrosia, was I
affected when I (first) saw her without any clothing."

No. 473: "For the sake of the dark-eyed girls whose
hips and thighs are visible through their wet dresses
when they bathe in the afternoon, does Kama [the god of
love] wield his bow."

Again and again the poets express their raptures over exaggerated
busts and hips, often in disgustingly coarse comparisons--lines which
cannot be quoted here.[275]

LYRICS AND DRAMAS

In his _History of Indian Literature_ (209), Weber says that

"the erotic lyric commences for us with certain of the poems
attributed to Kalidasa." "The later Kavyas are to be ranked
with the erotic poems rather than with the epic. In general
this love-poetry is of the most unbridled and extravagantly
sensual description; yet examples of deep and truly romantic
tenderness are